I was thinking about that when I was dropping my 6 year old off at some hobbies earlier - it’s pretty much expected to have learned how to ride a bicycle before starting school, and it massively expands the area you can go to by yourself. When she went to school by bicycle she can easily make a detour via a shop to spend some pocket money before coming home, while by foot that’d be rather time consuming.

Quite a lot of friends from outside of Europe either can’t ride a bicycle, or were learning it as adult after moving here, though.

edit: the high number of replies mentioning “swimming” made me realize that I had that filed as a basic skill pretty much everybody has - probably due to swimming lessons being a mandatory part of school education here.

  • idotherock
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    10 months ago

    Rural Japan.

    My kids (2 and 4) can use chopsticks already. Plenty of restaurants around here where you won’t see a spoon, fork or knife. (However, it’s certainly possible to ask the staff for western cutlery, and in the main cities they’re more likely to be prepared for that question)